President Jonathan On Apple As World’s Most Valuable Company

Today, President Jonathan posted an update on his Facebook page that seemingly suggests a myopic view of Apple’s success as a technology company.

The president described Apple as a “knowledge based firm” and acknowledged the fact that the company overtook ExxonMobil as the world’s most valuable company. He further said that the news vindicates his decision to allocate huge capital to education as well as building more Universities.

Well, for one thing, Apple Inc. is not a knowledge-based firm. It’s a technology corporation that designs and markets personal computers, consumer electronics and computer software. For another, Apple is not a University and no matter how much is allocated into the education sector, Nigeria cannot become known for consumer electronics manufacturing, if local technology companies are not encouraged.

President Jonathan concluded his update by saying that since knowledge is more valuable than oil as can be seen on the world stage, Nigeria must focus on building the knowledge capacity of Nigerians, if the country is to succeed.

Critics have argued that there are more pressing problems such as power and infrastructure that if tackled responsibly could make the country become a desirable nation. It appears that the president’s remarks show that his administration doesn’t have any plans to grow local technology companies to dominate on the world stage.

Here’s President Jonathan’s update on Facebook:

Last week, Apple, a knowledge based firm, overtook oil giant ExxonMobil as the world’s most valuable company. This vindicates my decision to devote the lion’s share of capital allocation to education as well as build more universities. Why? Because Nigeria has both knowledge and oil and now we see on the world stage that knowledge is more valuable than oil. It follows that if we must build value in Nigeria we must focus on building the knowledge capacity of Nigerians. GEJ

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